Confusion in Education

Today the Kansas Legislature began a special session to deal with the Kansas Supreme Court's ruling ordering the Legislature to increase funding for Kansas public schools.

Any nation, any state, any city, any group that wants to compete in the global economy must make excellence in education a top priority. Kansas lawmakers would be foolish to do anything less than provide for the best possible education for Kansas children.

However the Kansas Supreme Court ruling is a classic example of confusing additional funding with progress toward excellence. The Kansas Court declared that since the State of Kansas funds public schools at a lower level than the funding level recommended by one group of consultants, the state is failing to provide even an adequate education for the children of Kansas. The court decided to define the quality of an education by the amount of money spent on that education, not based the outcomes that come from that spending.

Understandably, Kansas educators support the court ordered additional funding. If you asked lawyers if we should spend more money on lawyers I'm sure they would say yes, if you asked McDonalds employees if we should spend more on fry cooks I'm sure they would also say yes, it's rational self interest. However the important contradiction is that Kansas teachers also claim that they provide students not just with an adequate education, but an excellent education.

From today's Lawrence Journal World:

"Deena Burnett, who will teach at West Junior High in the next school year, urged legislators to increase funding.

"It's evident we have one of the premier education systems in the entire United States. We can't continue short changenge it," Burnett said."

The NEA even has statistics attesting to the comparative excellence of Kansas schools:

""Do the right thing," Kansas NEA President Christy Levings said. "We need solid, stable funding for our schools."

She said Kansas teacher salaries were 44th in the nation, while the state routinely ranks in the top 10 states in student performance."

The problem is that if Kansas is in the top 10 states in student performance, it is hard to see how we are failing to even provide a suitable education for our students. In comparison to other states Kansas provides an excellent education, in comparison to other nations Kansas probably provides a mediocre education but that is another discussion.

Are Kansas teachers underpaid, I don't know. 44th in the nation sounds bad, but the cost of living in Kansas is also dramatically lower than in many other parts of the nation. If teachers are underpaid, then we should increase their pay, but it seems like the salaries Kansas teachers earn are adequate to motivate highly qualified individuals to enter teaching, and once they enter the profession it seems like they are doing a more than adequate job at teaching our children.

The point is that the court has chosen an arbitrary standard that has little to do with educational excellence and gotten in the middle of the political process, a process that requires the balancing of many interests, and a process the Supreme Court is unqualified to deal with.

If Kansas education is really sub par, then it needs more than a few million dollars, it needs a real shake up and a lot of these less than adequate teachers should lose their jobs. If Kansas is providing a suitable education and our teachers are as good as we think they are, then the court should step aside and let the legislature set the appropriate level of funding.

Timothy Burger